Virtualization, as applied to computers and storage, is a very mature idea and is well along in technology maturing lifecycles. Benefits of virtualization include significantly lower costs, faster provisioning and a more efficient use of resources. A next logical step in virtualization is to incorporate all forms of networking including routing, switching, and security along with a breadth of protocols needed for enhanced network service delivery.
For service providers, business and operational support systems were designed and implemented with the basic premise that revenue bearing services are created, offered, deployed and terminated in a period of months dictating the foundation of most back office processes and systems. An emergence of virtualization, cloud computing, and use of virtualization and cloud computing, as a revenue-enabling activation platform in software defined network/network function virtualization (SDN/NFV) based production environments, may reduce service creation times significantly.
An operational support system infrastructure, including service assurance, may facilitate a high transaction volume of change.
When business targets are archived by implementing standard or proprietary solutions, operational aspects of virtualization may become significant. Therefore, requirements on dynamic deployment and runtime management of both virtualized network elements and network services, based on a virtualized network infrastructure, may need to be introduced.